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Less than two months after rocket failure, astronauts launching to International Space Station

A Russian Soyuz rocket launch failed en route to the International Space Station on Thursday, Oct. 11, 2018. An American astronaut and Russian cosmonaut are safe.
Florida Today

In the Integration Facility at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, Expedition 58 crew member Anne McClain of NASA runs through procedures in the Soyuz MS-11 spacecraft during a vehicle fit check Nov. 20. McClain, Oleg Kononenko of Roscosmos and David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency will launch Dec. 3 on the Soyuz MS-11 spacecraft from Baikonur for a six-and-a-half month mission on the International Space Station.(Photo: NASA/Victor Zelentsov)

As a 3-year-old in Spokane, Washington, Anne McClain told her parents she was going to preschool to learn to be an astronaut.

“I don’t know what struck me at that age, I can’t define it,” said McClain, a 39-year-old Army colonel and NASA astronaut. “But I do know that it’s been something so magical, that has given me such a purpose my whole life, and I’m really looking forward to achieving it.”

McClain has a chance to realize her lifelong dream of spaceflight when she boards a Russian rocket for a 6:31 a.m. EST Monday blastoff from Kazakhstan to the International Space Station with Russian and Canadian crewmates.

She’ll be the first NASA astronaut to strap into a Russian Soyuz capsule since a similar rocket failed less than two months ago, triggering the first aborted launch by a Soyuz crew in 35 years.

The capsule carrying NASA's Nick Hague and cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin jettisoned from the rocket 31 miles up and made an emergency landing from which they walked away unscathed.

Russian investigators said a sensor damaged during the Soyuz-FG rocket’s assembly prevented one of four strap-on boosters from separating properly, causing it to strike the core booster.

The rocket has launched successfully several times since then without astronauts, and McClain says she’s confident it will provide a safe ride Monday for her, Canadian David Saint-Jacques and Russian Oleg Kononenko.

“I would not be sitting here if didn’t have confidence in this rocket and these systems,” McClain told reporters last month in interviews broadcast on NASA TV. “The crew was lucky, but every crew that makes it to orbit is lucky. Spaceflight’s not easy.”

If all goes well Monday, McClain will dock at the station orbiting 250 miles overhead about six hours after lifting off, starting a more than six-month stay.

In the Integration Facility at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, Expedition 58 crew members Anne McClain of NASA (left), Oleg Kononenko of Roscosmos (center) and David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency (right) posed for pictures Nov. 20 in front of their Soyuz MS-11 spacecraft during a vehicle fit check. They will launch Dec. 3 on the Soyuz MS-11 spacecraft from Baikonur for a six-and-a-half month mission on the International Space Station.(Photo: NASA/Victor Zelentso)

A successful launch and docking is critical to ensuring that NASA and its 15 partners don’t need to temporarily abandon the $100 billion space station, which recently marked the 20th anniversary of the first module’s launch and 18 years of uninterrupted human presence on board.

The three-person Expedition 57 crew currently in orbit, including NASA’s Serena Auñón-Chancellor, is due to return home Dec. 20. Their Soyuz craft is not designed to stay in space beyond early January.

The official insignia for the three-member Expedition 58 crew with Anne McClain of NASA, Oleg Kononenko of Roscosmos and David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency.(Photo: NASA)

NASA says the outpost could fly without people, controlled from the ground, for a significant period of time if necessary, barring major failures to multiple systems.

So far, life on the orbiting research complex measuring the length of a football field has carried on more or less as usual, despite being short two crew members.

“When that Soyuz wasn’t able to make it up here the first time, we do miss those guys, but we are super-excited to see this next Soyuz get here on Monday, knock on wood,” Auñón-Chancellor told CBS News on Thursday.

Auñón-Chancellor commended a “tremendous job” by the Russians to return the Soyuz to flight so quickly, even moving McClain's flight up by one week.

Auñón-Chancellor's return to Earth with Alexander Gerst of Germany and cosmonaut Sergey Prokopyev was pushed back a week, providing more overlap with McClain’s Expedition 58 crew, if it launches on schedule.

Expedition 57 Flight Engineer Nick Hague of NASA embraces his wife Catie after landing at the Krayniy Airport with Expedition 57 Flight Engineer Alexey Ovchinin of Roscosmos, Thursday, Oct. 11, 2018 in Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Hague and Ovchinin arrived from Zhezkazgan after Russian search-and-rescue teams brought them from the Soyuz landing site. During the Soyuz MS-10 spacecraft's climb to orbit, an anomaly occurred, resulting in an abort downrange. The crew was quickly recovered and is in good condition.(Photo: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

At home in Houston on Oct. 11, McClain followed the launch failure involving Hague, a fellow member of NASA's 2013 astronaut class who was flying for the first time.

“There wasn’t really a lot of emotion in it until after reflecting on it, obviously understanding that Nick is OK,” she said. “I saw that as a success, because we had Nick and Alexey home that night.”

Days later she received a debrief from Hague, a 43-year-old Air Force colonel for whom spaceflight also was a childhood dream, upon his return home. Before his launch, they had exchanged hugs with plans to meet again on the space station.

“I said, ‘Hey, not we’re supposed to have gravity right now,’” McClain recalled.

At the Baikonur Cosmodrome Museum in Kazakhstan, Expedition 58 crew member Anne McClain of NASA signed a wall mural on Nov. 29 as part of traditional pre-launch activities. McClain, David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency and Oleg Kononenko of Roscosmos will launch Dec. 3 in the Soyuz MS-11 spacecraft from Baikonur for a six-and-a-half month mission on the International Space Station.(Photo: NASA/Victor Zelentsov)

As an Army OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopter pilot with combat experience, and now an astronaut, McClain says she understands and accepts the risks and rewards of spaceflight.

She tries to communicate that perspective to her friends and family, including a young son.

“I really hope that what kids take away from it is the amount of work that goes in to achieving a dream, and that it is worth it,” she said.

Contact Dean at 321-917-4534 or jdean@floridatoday.com. And follow on Twitter at @flatoday_jdean and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/FlameTrench.